I need some advice on how we can get back in the saddle. Direct
discussions about the problem make him feel worse and more
inadequate. He’s even admitted he avoids situations where
we might fool around, because if he doesn’t try, he can’t
fail. I’m getting a bit desperate—I’m having fantasies about
posting on Craigslist and finding some NSA sex—but really,
I just want to have hot sex with my husband! I want to be
understanding, but I also really need to get some. Asking
him to use a strap-on is just plain insensitive, right?

—Help
One Really Neglected Young Woman

Your
husband avoids “fool around situations,” or FAS, because he
feels like he won’t be able to satisfy you, his theory being,
“no bone, no satisfaction.” That seems to be your theory too,
HORNYW, and embracing it is making your problem worse. It’s
perfectly understandable that he would avoid FAS—and the humiliation
of failure—until he’s absolutely positive he can keep it up.
That’s why the best approach in a situation like this is to
take the focus—and the pressure—off the guy’s dick. Tell him
he can’t fail to satisfy you with oral sex, masturbation,
and toys (perhaps working your way up to strap-ons), and he’ll
begin to think of sex as something he’s good at again, boned
or boneless.

And guess what, HORNYW? You may find that once your husband
is not expected to produce an erection during FAS, his dick
starts getting hard. However, resist the urge to jump on his
cock the first time—the first few dozen times—if he gets hard
while he’s eating your pussy or using his hand to get you
off. If you selfishly jump on one of those early hard-ons
and he loses his erection, well, you might as well take a
belt sander to his balls.

So those first erections? They’re not for you, HORNYW, they’re
for him. You should both agree in advance that if he gets
hard and wants to get off, he’s going to beat off while he
eats you out, or fingers you, or watches you get yourself
off. Before you can reconnect with his dick, your husband
has to reconnect with it, i.e., he needs to get back to a
time when his dick was something that gave him pleasure, not
something that failed to satisfy you. Trust me, HORNYW, when
that happens he’ll fuck you senseless so often that you’ll
long for the days of FAS avoidance.

I’m 21 and I’ve always had trouble coming during sex, no
matter the position, size of the guy, etc. But it doesn’t
bother me because I have no trouble coming during oral or
manual stimulation. So it’s never really been a problem—until
I started sleeping with this new guy. Soon after I start moaning
and getting into it, he starts whispering for me to “come
on baby.” When he’s about to come he’s like, “I hope you’re
getting close, I want to come with you.” And then after we’re
done he’ll ask if I got there or not! I’ve told him that I
basically just don’t come during sex, but that doesn’t deter
him, and I’m getting kind of sick of the pressure. Should
I just fake it?

—Pestered
Girl

A
woman should never fake an orgasm during vaginal intercourse,
PG, as it reinforces the most damaging misconception there
is about female sexuality—namely, that all women can climax
from vaginal intercourse alone. In fact only 25 percent of
women can come during vaginal intercourse. The overwhelming
majority of women require additional focused clitoral stimulation—manually,
orally, a vibrator. If your current boyfriend is really invested
in you getting off while he’s fucking you, tell him that he’s
going to have to get a hand down there too or be cool with
you using your hand while he fucks you. Or he can buy himself
one of those cockrings with a vibrator built into the top
of it, and grind that into your clit while he fucks you.

I love hearing my boyfriend say nasty things to me while
we fuck. My problem is that my boyfriend doesn’t like to talk
dirty. He says he doesn’t think he’s good at it. I don’t need
dirty talk to get off, so our sex life is still great. But
how do I coax him out of his shell?

—Girl
Wants A Bedtime Story

Tell
your boyfriend that all he needs to do during sex is tell
you what he’s about to do (“I’m going to fuck you . . . ”),
tell you what he’s doing (“I’m fucking you . . . ”), and tell
you what he’s just done (“I fucked you . . . ”). He doesn’t
have to be an expert at dirty talk to do that, he just has
to be able to keep his tenses straight. If he’s got a high-school
education he should be able to do that much.

You recently wrote, “Each and every one of us embarrasses
himself in some way when he loses his virginity. Mortification
can’t be avoided.” I thought it would be great if you asked
your readers for their embarrassing stories about losing their
virginities. That way your yet-to-be-deflowered readers won’t
feel alone when they have their mortifying moments.

I’ll start: My freshman year of college I had been dating
my girlfriend for a couple months. We had done pretty much
everything else there was to do and we were in love, like
any good freshman couple, so we decided to both have sex for
the first time. Since it was her first time, it was rather
painful for her and I went very slowly, moving just half an
inch deeper at a time. Finally I was all the way in and stopped.
She felt me stop and sweetly said the words every man longs
to hear in bed: “Is that it?” She was asking me if I was all
the way in or whether she should brace for more, she didn’t
realize what she had said until it was too late. I was mortified,
of course, and it took much consoling to rebuild my male confidence.

—My
Ego Eventually Recovered

That’s
a swell idea, MEER. Savage Love readers are hereby invited
to e-mail their mortifying true stories of losing their virginities.
Keep ’em under 200 words and send ’em to virgin@ savagelove.net.
I’ll run a bunch in an upcoming column—I may even include
my own deeply mortifying tale o’ woe.

Speaking o’ tales o’ woe, remember SASA? He was the straight
boy who, thinking only with his dick, went to a strange woman’s
dark apartment in the middle of the night for a NSA blowjob.
The oral turned into anal and the woman turned out to be a
dude. SASA was a bit stressed—about HIV, about doing a dude—and
I addressed those issues. He also wanted to know if he was
raped and, if he was, what he should do about it. I invited
Savage Love readers to weigh in and you can read the expert
legal analysis, accusations of urban-legend propagation, eerily
similar tales of woe, and confessions from guys who’ve taken
advantage of other straight guys like SASA at link.thestranger.com/
surprisedate. http://www.metroland.net/savage
extra.html